Swiss Market Ends On Firm Note

(RTTNews) - The Switzerland market shrugged off a slightly weak start and climbed higher on Wednesday after soft inflation data from the U.S. raised hopes the Federal Reserve will reduce interest rate a couple of times this year.

The benchmark SMI ended up by 94.67 points or 0.78% at 12,167.59. The index, which edged down to 12,061.93 in early trades, climbed to a high of 12,185.77 in the final hour.

VAT Group shares rallied 3.77%. ABB gained nearly 3%, while Partners Group, Julius Baer and Holcim climbed 2.2% each.

Logitech International ended 1.63% up, while Swatch Group, Swiss Life Holding, Geberit, Roche Holding, Schindler Ps, Richemont and Sika gained 1 to 1.4%. Zurich Insurance Group and Sandoz Group also closed notably higher.

Flughafen Zurich gained about 1.3%. The company announced that its May passenger traffic jumped 9.4% year over year to 2,772,182. The Zurich Airport operator's turnover likewise increased by 3.5% to 55.4 million francs.

Lonza Group ended down 2.02%. Swisscom and SIG Group closed lower by 1.28% and 1.2%, respectively, while Sonova drifted down nearly 0.9%.